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UN set bad precedent by removing S Arabia from blacklist under pressure: Analyst

Saturday, 11 June 2016 6:11 AM [ Last Update: Saturday, 11 June 2016 6:12 AM ]

Yemeni children look at buildings damaged in airstrikes carried out by Saudi Arabia in the UNESCO-listed old city of the Yemeni capital, Sana’a, March 23, 2016. (Photo by AFP)

Press TV has interviewed Ali al-Ahmed, a political analyst, about recent developments regarding the United Nations (UN)’s decision to remove Saudi Arabia from a blacklist of the violators of children’s rights under pressure from the Saudi monarchy. France has called for the UN and Riyadh to resolve differences.

Read a rough transcription of the interview below.

Press TV: In light of how this exchange took place over last week, shouldn’t France be condemning Riyadh’s role in this?

Ahmed: Absolutely! This shows you and gives you really an insight in the mindset of some Western leaders. The French foreign minister clearly expressed not only ignorance or ignoring the plight of the Yemeni children but really expressed his own hatred, honestly, to the Yemeni children by not even recognizing their suffering in the statement.

Really, this goes to show you how much bigoted some Western leaders are vis-à-vis Arab and Muslim people, including children like we saw in Yemen. For him not to mention the victims here really is a stain that should be recognized by the international media.

Press TV: And now if this precedent is set, where a country can get a blacklisting removed for threatening to hold back humanitarian aid, what would that do for the UN’s image and credibility?

Ahmed: Exactly! What Ban Ki-moon used to shield the criticism of him bowing down to the Saudis, saying that, “Oh, I’m doing this for the children,” that actually shows that more children will die on the world because now everyone knows how to pressure the United Nations, including the secretary general, and how this organization… and I’ve said this before on your station… it (the UN) is a very corrupt bureaucratic and by large useless organization that has played major part in abusing children and people and in creating misery for millions of people around the world.

Press TV: And what is to say about Riyadh using pressure in this fashion to try to hush child death atrocities that it’s committed in Yemen?

Ahmed: It is in the gens, in the culture and in the tradition of the Saudi government to abuse children, to kill children. We saw that, we see that every day in the policy of Saudi Arabia, the only country in the world that allows the marriage of children, the only country in the world that kills children or imprisons children even at the mass number and it is the only country in the world really that treats most women as children.

So, you are looking at the government that really has very very bad policy vis-à-vis children.

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